Steve Babaeko is the Chief Executive Officer of X3M and chairman of the Event Planning Committee, 2019 Lagos Advertising and Ideas Festival (LAIF) Awards. He shares with Akin Adewakun, the committee’s plan to ensure a hitch-free event.
Three years of being the chairman of the Event Planning Committee of the Lagos Advertising and Ideas Festival (LAIF) must have been an interesting one, can you let us into how the journey has been?
Anybody that is involved in the organisation of this kind of Award, in Nigeria, would understand how difficult it is to sustain Awards, such as this, over the years. LAIF is one of the key pillars of the AAAN (Association of Advertising Agencies of Nigeria), and it is in its 13th year now. We are super-excited that the tradition remains unbroken. Secondly, what is paramount in our minds now is: how do we look inward and get people to be more excited about the Award? Yes there is a couple of awards that Nigerian advertising is part of, at regional and global stages, but this one is our own. If we don’t support our own, who will?
What are you doing differently, this time around?
Apart from the fact that we’ve kept the tradition going, we are looking forward to see more participation from the newer or younger agencies. We believe the younger agencies are the lifeblood of the industry. If we can’t get the younger agencies to be a part of it, then what is the point? That’s what is going to guarantee that the longevity that we plan for the industry, will continue. Secondly, we just think this year, will be a celebration of our own culture, and you can even see that in the theme of this year’s award, ‘Tori Tori’. It’s about telling our own stories. Over the years, what we’ve seen is that you are looking for a little material, some form of background literature about an institution or a person, in Nigeria, and you now go to the BBC before you can get such materials. I think it’s a little bit embarrassing. So we decided that, instead of leaving our stories, as Africans, as Nigerians, for other people to tell, this time let’s concentrate on telling our own stories. This is what informed the theme: ToriTori, the story of LAIF. And you will see that we are ready to walk the talk. You will see how all of that will come through, even in the dress code for this year. It’s going to be purely Nigerian. It’s one thing for us to want to imbibe what foreigners do, but also if we don’t celebrate our own like I say, who will do it? So all of those things will really come to play. We are expecting the keen contest that is normally associated with LAIF; since that is our own ‘premiership’. Everybody wants to see the top five –ten agencies for the year. So the contest is expected to be keen. As for the Jury list, we have Mr. Gbemi Sagay. He is going to be the Jury President. What we are just trying to do is to bring some of the veterans and mix them with some of the young practising advertising practitioners in Nigeria. We are also looking at getting help from some of our colleagues from Ghana and other parts of Africa, to make it a much more robust list. I think this should be an exciting year, where we can see the best of experience come to judge the best of work in Nigeria. And if you look at it now, LAIF is clearly the best advertising award in Nigeria, if I may say so, and undoubtedly one of the biggest on the continent.
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How ready, now, are those African countries you told us last year were ready to participate in this year’s edition of LAIF?
We are still waiting for some entries, hopefully, from at least may be one African country to participate. The vision of the award has always been to be, even if it’s not like the continental award, let it be a sub-regional award. But as you know getting some of our brothers and sisters on the West Coast to jump on it, has been a little bit of a challenge, but we will not stop trying.
There was a time the Ghanaian Advertising President was showing interest?
Yes. That was two years ago, I think. We actually followed up. You know there is a new Pharaoh who does not know Joseph. They too had succession happening at their end. The president that was interested is not the one that is there now, and some of these logistics problems always crop up. But like I said, it’s something that we are very passionate about, and we will not stop at pursuing such.
Are we looking at a probable change in nomenclature from Lagos Advertising and Ideas Festival, if we begin to get participation from neighbouring African countries?
No, it’s like saying why is Cannes, a creativity award? Cannes is just a small village in Europe, and the name has not stopped agencies from the US and even Africa, from coming to participate in the festival, all through these years. So I don’t think the name should be any issue really.
Any new category this year?
Yes. A new category, Advertiser of The Year, is likely to be introduced this year. It is meant for one brand, one company, that has supported and has invested in more robust advertising created for it. We think that will help stimulate other clients to want to support, not just advertising, but creative advertising. Remember, this Award is all about creativity and the efficacy of communication. So we are trying to push that this year, and for the client who supports advertising, and who supports their agencies to be more creative, we single them out, and we honour them appropriately.
Last year you complained about low number of entries, what is the response like to this year’s Award?
Well entries are still coming in, but we are hoping and really optimistic. This is why we’ve been paying courtesy calls to people and telling them the importance of participating in the Award. I mean to get a LAIF Award on your shelf for the work you’ve done for a client, is an evidence that, as an agency, you are still very relevant in the scheme of things. There are agencies that continue to win it, year in, year out. You can tell the agencies that are really doing well by the number of entries they are able to put in, and the number of entries they are able to win. This is why we are encouraging the young agencies, because for me, there is nothing like a big agency. You are either a creative agency, or you are not. I expect even the younger agencies to be hungrier.
Is it that there is a dichotomy between LAIF agencies and non-LAIF agencies, that some agencies do not expect to win, and do not even bother to enter, and some expect to win and they enter for the Award?
I think it’s a bit of both. In fairness to small agencies, entering for this type of award, costs a lot of money. You are looking at your over-head, you are looking at your budget. It’s the same thing with the foreign awards. You find that agencies from Africa struggle to win Cannes. Sometimes it’s a question of how many entries do you have. You have a small agency, quote and unquote, in Europe, that runs a small operation of maybe 10 to 20 people, and they earn their money in Euro. So if they are entering for Cannes at maybe 200 or 150 Euro, it doesn’t hurt them. A mid-sized agency in Nigeria, that earns their money in Naira, might find that a tall order.